Wasson’s Swan Song?

Wasson high school has been a fixture of the Colorado Springs community since 1959. But enrollment at the school has dropped in recent years, and as district 11 administrators think about how to best use the district’s limited resources, talk has turned to closing Wasson. The school board will be voting on the issue tonight, and in anticipation of that vote, we spoke with parents, teachers, and board members, to get a sense of what’s at stake in the debate. All interviews were conducted by Carey Whitfield.Wasson’s Swan Song?

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Tonight’s meeting will take place at 6pm at the district administration building–1115 North El Paso Street–and is open to the public. The agenda for the meeting is available HERE. The documents detailing the entire proposed optimization of utilization plan are available HERE . If you’d prefer to watch the meeting online, it will be streaming live HERE.

The following video captures the sights and sounds of a demonstration march conducted by Wasson high School supporters from the school to District 11 Headquarters, a distance of 3 miles.

3 Responses to Wasson’s Swan Song?

It is very important that you are helping us on this discussion. There is constant conversation on how to revitalize and improve downtown Colorado Springs. One thing that will not work is cutting off the arteries to the heart of the city. Neighborhoods like the Wasson area are ten minutes from downtown. Closing down these neighborhoods forces people away from the downtown. Keeping a life surrounding the downtown area is how to improve the area. Closing Wasson amounts to taking another chunk out of a downtown that could be much more.

I wonder why some of the students that are at other large schools like Coronado, Palmer, Dogherty cannot be moved to Wasson to lessen their sizes. District 11 continues to create massive schools with staggeringly large student bodies and giagantic class sizes. As a parent and teacher I am concerned about the size of the classes that we are forming, small class sizes allow for better classroom management, more tailored instruction, and better teacher-student relationships. I would hate to see Wasson close, moving those students into other high schools that have huge student bodies already.

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